


Abide With Me

by FalconHonour



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Christmas Eve, Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Spiritual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:28:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25405396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FalconHonour/pseuds/FalconHonour
Summary: The two Pevensie sisters both sing 'Abide With Me' on two very different Christmases. Both times affect Susan. But do they affect her for the better?An old story I've always been quite proud of. Copied across from FFNet.
Kudos: 6





	1. I: Christmas 1939

**Finchley, Christmas 1939**

Susan Pevensie stood in front of the looking glass in her parents' bedroom, nervously smoothing down the front of her best white dress. She'd been chosen to sing a solo at the Christmas Eve Family Service Finchley Methodist Chapel that night and she wanted to look her best. Her dark hair was still plaited down her back, but her mother had promised to unplait it before they left for the Church that night, so that it would be freshly curled.

"You look beautiful, Susan." Her mother Helen came in just then, and came to stand behind her, looking at her daughter's reflection in the mirror. "Are you nervous?"

"No," Susan lied, then immediately changed her mind. "Yes. I suppose I am, just a little. I know I know the song, but it's just such an occasion…I wish Dad were here."

Susan's voice cracked as she spoke. She, of all the children, had been particularly close to their father, and it had been her he had spent the longest saying goodbye to at Charing Cross Station when he left for war three months earlier. Helen slipped her arm around Susan's shoulders.

"You know he'll be thinking of you, darling. You've written to him, he knows you're doing this. He'll be thinking of you, Susie. And you'll do him proud. I know you will. Now, do you want me to undo your hair?"

"Yes please, Mum," Susan nodded, relaxing just the tiniest bit once Helen had untied the blue ribbons at the ends of each plait and run a brush over the plaits to loosen them into waves. Coming round to stand in front of her, Helen tucked an Alice band covered in pearl-coloured velvet into Susan's hair to keep it out of her face.

"There. Perfect."

"Thanks."

Susan's voice was soft and Helen wished she could help her overcome her nerves. She knew, however, that Susan would be fine once she was standing in the Choir stalls, so she didn't even try, only squeezed her shoulders as she said, "Go and put your coat on. I'll tell Peter to walk you down while I get Ed and Lu ready."

"Of course," With the faintest of smiles, Susan was gone, ready as always to do her mother's bidding. Helen watched her go wistfully.

* * *

"You'll be fine. I know you will," Peter assured her, helping her out of her coat. Susan nodded.

"I just need to warm up."

"You do that then. I'm going to go back home and help Mum."

"Of course. Oh and Peter?"

Her brother paused halfway to the church door, "Yes?"

"Try not to be too hard on Edmund. It is Christmas."

"It's the same for all of us."

"Yes, but Dad wouldn't want you to spoil Christmas by fighting. I know he wouldn't."

A glance full of meaning passed between the siblings and then Peter murmured, "Dad would be proud, Susie." He hurried out before Susan could reply.

* * *

And then it was time. Susan stood with the other sopranos, all of them dressed in white, trying to hide the shaking in her hands. The organist struck up and her best friend Jennifer stepped forward,

" _Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;  
The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide;  
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,  
Help of the helpless, oh,"_

Susan chimed in with the others, taking confidence in the melded voices as they all sang the last three words, _"abide with me."_

Susan was the third soloist and had the third verse. When the time came, she stepped forward and found her mother's eyes in the audience before raising her head just a fraction higher.

For an instant, she let her father's face swim before her eyes. Then she opened her mouth and the words came flooding out,

" _I need Thy presence every passing hour;  
What but Thy grace can foil the tempter's pow'r?  
Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?  
Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me"_

As she finished, Susan swiped at her eyes. No one was allowed to see her cry. Not here, not now. She had to be the strong one. She'd promised her father. She'd promised him she'd help her mother and that meant she couldn't cry. Not unless she was alone.

Suddenly, muffled by the chords and the soaring voices, she thought she heard a lion's roar.

She shook it off. It was impossible. The nearest lions were the ones in London Zoo, and one could never hear them from Finchley Chapel. She had to be imagining things.

But, imagined or not, she couldn't deny that the lion's roar had given her courage. Courage to face her first Christmas without her father.

Susan raised her head again and joined in the final verse, finding Jennifer's hand as she did so. They always sang the last verse hand in hand. Her lips curved in a smile, and for once, for what felt like the first time since her father had left for war, it was a genuine smile. A smile that actually meant something.


	2. Christmas 1945

**Finchley, Christmas 1945**

"Do I _have_ to come? It's only the family service. I'll come tomorrow morning for Communion," Susan groaned, as her mother put her head round the door to ask her to join the family for Christmas Eve service at Finchley Methodist.

"Susan! Lucy's singing "Abide with me!" She's singing a solo, just like you did, years back. You wouldn't spoil it for her by not coming, would you?"

Susan hesitated, and Helen pressed on, "And it's your father's first Christmas home in six years. You wouldn't make him miss Lucy's solo, now, would you? Or spoil it by not coming? Do come with us."

"He wasn't there for mine," Susan muttered, and Helen sighed.

"There was a war on, Susan. He was doing his bit for King and Country. That's why he wasn't there. You know he would have been there if he'd been able to get leave. Now don't spoil his evening by sulking. Come on."

"Fine. For Dad's sake, I suppose."

Susan rolled her eyes, but swung herself up from her bed and walked over to her wardrobe. If she was going to go to this service, she was going to make sure she was the prettiest girl there.

* * *

An hour later, Susan found herself seated between her parents in the family pew, listening to the closing remarks of the vicar's sermon. It was quite a novel experience for her, for she hadn't attended many services since she stopped singing in the church choir and, the few she had attended, her father hadn't been home. He hadn't been seated beside her, his hand resting in her lap, even as he leaned over to whisper something into Peter's ear. Susan relished in the feel of his hand in her lap; in the sense of security it gave her, and laid her own hands over his, the way she had once seen her mother do.

Sensing her touch, her father glanced over at her and smiled, but just then, the choir rose from their places to sing the final hymn and his eyes snapped to the front, burning with pride as he watched Lucy, little golden Lucy, rise with the rest.

She couldn't help it. A surge of jealousy rose in her breast. How dare Lucy take her father's attention like that? She, Susan, had always been their father's favourite, not Lucy. He should have been there, all those years ago, listening to _her_ voice soaring out with the rest, not Lucy's. He should have been watching _her_ sing, not Lucy. After all, everyone knew Susan had the sweeter voice.

But Lucy had the innocence that was needed to carry off the penultimate verse and so it was the younger Pevensie girl that captivated the congregation as she stepped forward, clasped her hands before her breast and raised her voice to sing,

" _I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless;  
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness;  
Where is death's sting? Where, grave, thy victory?  
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me"_

As her sister finished, Susan heard a deep, joyful rumble, as though a lion had heard her sister and was roaring in approval. Glancing at her siblings, she knew they had heard it too.

Peter shifted in his seat, drawing himself up proudly, bearing himself like a noble, _"Like a King"_ flashed through Susan's mind, before she caught herself sharply. Peter had never been a King! He was barely out of school, for Goodness' Sake!

Edmund, meanwhile, lost that slightly haunted look that had been troubling him ever since the start of the Christmas holidays and let his features relax into a relieved half-smile. For her part, Lucy was beaming, visibly overflowing with joy. It was obvious that her younger siblings were basking in the glory of a glow that, try as she might, eluded Susan.

Masking the hurt that stabbed at her heart behind a cheery smile, she turned quickly to her father as the service ended and he started to stand up, hiding a grimace at the pain his bad shoulder was giving him, "Dad. Come with me. Martha and Jennifer's families are over there. We must go and say hello."

For a moment, she feared that he might see through her ruse, see that all she really wanted to do was win him for herself, secure his attention before he could lavish praise upon her little sister. The old Dad would have done.

But not this one, "Whatever you want, sweetheart," he assured her, letting her rest her hand on his arm and steer him over towards her old friends.

As they went down the aisle of the church, nodding at their acquaintances as they did so, Susan heard people whispering to their neighbours, "Look at young Susan. Doesn't she look gorgeous, sailing along on Michael's arm like that? She's really blossoming, that girl. She might have been born a lady."

The sweet compliments were balm to Susan's wounds. She smiled openly, tilting her chin just a fraction higher. The congregation fell back from her as though she were a Princess – _a Queen -_ and she was filled with triumphant happiness as, for once in her life, she bested her brothers and sister at something.

It wasn't the same joy that her siblings had found in the service. It could never be the same. After all, it wasn't consolation and peace; it was more like success, a hard-fought, yet still incomplete, success. But it was something. It was something and it would do.

In lieu of anything better, it would do.


End file.
